


Matrimonial Misunderstandings

by firefright



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Alpha Dick Grayson, Alpha Slade Wilson, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Historical, F/M, Kidnapping, M/M, Mating Bond, Minor Jason Todd/Rose Wilson, Misunderstandings, Secret Relationship, Slade can't help but be an ass about everything
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:14:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27306133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firefright/pseuds/firefright
Summary: It's been a week since Deathstroke stole Jason away from his family, and in that time Dick hasn't been able to stop himself from worrying just what a mercenary alpha like Slade could want with a royal omega. Even worse, he hasn't been able to stop himself from feeling like a fool for ever believing what he and Slade shared between them was real. Once he arrives at the Wilson family estate in pursuit of his kidnapped brother, however, it's to soon find that not everything about Jason's apparent abduction is as it first seemed.
Relationships: Dick Grayson/Slade Wilson
Comments: 28
Kudos: 198
Collections: SladeRobin Week 2020





	Matrimonial Misunderstandings

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all! Here's my Day 7 piece for this year's SladeRobin Week, based off the prompt 'Stolen Bride'. Hope you enjoy!

Dick is furious.

No, not just furious. He’s livid as he urges his horse forwards, up and across the rise that overlooks the Wilson family estate. It had been a hard week’s ride to get here, and Dick already fears they may be too late.

His younger brother, Jason, their pack’s only omega, had been stolen while out riding in the vast lands surrounding Wayne castle. The guards escorting him, following as always from a discreet distance whenever their charge was on horseback, had been found unconscious but otherwise miraculously unharmed. Which, as much as Dick’s father had been furious with them for letting it happen in the first place, was good, because it meant they had witnesses. A lead, to tell them the identity of the culprit.

Slade Wilson. Not a lord, not an enemy king, but a mercenary. One that Bruce had reluctantly hired to work for him in the recent past. One that, as much as he’d be reluctant to admit it in polite company, Dick knows very well himself.

It burns him to think that Slade did this. That he took Jason. That there hasn’t been even a note to demand ransom since, and that he headed for his own home afterwards. All of which points to Slade not doing it because he was paid to, but for his own nefarious gain.

And with a royal omega only days from his heat at the time, the possibilities for what that gain might be feel painfully small.

He—underneath the fear and worry for his brother, Dick burns with righteous indignation, and under that, with betrayal. He’d thought he’d known the man. Thought that Slade in turn had some consideration for him. As much as he was capable of, anyway. But now…

“I don’t like you going down there alone, Dick,” Roy Harper, the captain of his guard, says as he rides up beside him. “It could be a trap. And if he has hold of you, as well as Jason…”

“I know,” Dick’s fingers tighten around the reins in his hand. “But charging in headfirst isn’t the safest course, either. Not with my brother’s life on the line. I want to give him the chance to surrender peacefully first. Slade is a smart man, and not one to take risks foolishly. He’ll be waiting for us.”

Roy’s mouth curls downwards in displeasure. “You think you can talk him into giving Jason back.”

“I have to try.”

“And then what? He’ll surrender himself quietly for sentencing?” Roy snorts and shakes his head. “I think all you’ll be doing is giving him two royal hostages for the price of one.”

“Your opinion is duly noted, Captain Harper.” Dick replies staunchly, not without a hint of reproach in his voice.

Roy’s jaw clenches, but he dips his head a satisfactory amount in apology. “I meant no disrespect, Your Highness, just…” Straightening back up in the saddle, he says, “Don’t make me have to come in there and rescue both of you.”

“I won’t.” Dick nods his head, hoping the words aren’t a lie even as he says them. Roy is his friend, as well as his captain, and he hates the thought of worrying him just as much as he feels this course of action is necessary. “Give me three hours. If you don’t hear from me by then…” He purses his lips. “Act according to your best judgement, Roy. I trust you.”

That said, he digs his heels into Nightwing’s flanks and canters down the hillside.

* * *

Slade’s home is not a castle. Not even a fort. But it does have some defences in the form of a tall wall and strong gate. Dick expects to be forced to wait outside the latter, arguing his case while Slade watches him from above, but instead he’s surprised as the gate swings open before he even reaches it, allowing him to ride straight through to the courtyard beyond.

Reining Nightwing in, he slides off the stallion’s back and looks towards the front of the manor, where he’s not at all surprised to find Slade already waiting for him, sitting on the steps leading up to the main doorway of the house. Or more accurately, lounging on them, like an indolent cat, with his elbows braced against the topmost stair and his long legs crossed at the ankle over the bottom one.

“Hey, kid,” he says, completely unbothered as both Dick’s expression and scent darken in response. He’s casually dressed, in a black shirt and simple trousers, and the fact he hasn’t bothered to don even light armour for their meeting feels like even more of an insult. “My people spied you coming from about five miles away. Little surprised it took you so long; thought you’d be here sooner.”

“We had to stop to let the horses rest at some point.” Dick says tightly, clenching his fists.

“You could have swapped them out for fresh mounts along the way.” Slade counters, before his single eye slides back to Nightwing. “But ah, I forget how fond you are of that beast.”

“Where is my brother, Slade?”

“And straight to it, of course. I always liked that about you.”

Unable to hold himself back any longer, Dick growls, “You’re already facing imprisonment for this. Don’t make it worse.”

“Only imprisonment?” Slade answers glibly. “And here I thought it would be the executioner’s block.”

“It may be yet if you don’t start cooperating.”

He strides closer, and finally Slade sits up from his lounging position. Not enough to make it seem like he actually views Dick as a credible threat, of course, he’d never do that, but enough to make it clear that he’s ready to spring into action should he need to. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were angry about something.”

“You’d _think_?” Dick’s snarl twists his lips higher. Slade’s iron and woodsmoke scent is calm, distressingly so, but his own… “You stole my brother, Slade! Not just my brother but a member of the royal family! That’s treason at the very least. Why would you do that? What were you thinking?! You’re not even trying to hide it! And you brought him to your family home!”

“Of course I did. Where else would I take him?”

“That’s not—” Dick breathes in tight through his nose, feeling every inch of him tense in barely contained fury. “If you’ve hurt him, I swear I’ll kill you.”

Slade stands up, and for a moment looms over Dick in a way that floods his mind with memories of a different nature. “Why would you think I’ve hurt him?”

Dick sees red. “You stole him, Slade! My brother! An omega only days out from his heat!” He flares his nostrils, instinctively trying to pick up any hint of Jason’s scent from Slade as he says it, but all he can smell is the man himself. “And you just as good as admitted that you didn’t steal him for a job, which means…” He falters, then continues, quieter but no less venomous. “I thought I knew you. I thought—even though you’re a mercenary, you still have some sense of _honour_. Apparently I was wrong, though. Was it fun, using me to get to him? Playing me like a fiddle, knowing the fallout that would come down on me if anyone else ever found out about us? Did you laugh while kidnapping my brother? While rap—”

In an instant, Slade has closed the gap between them, one huge hand snagging the blue padded fabric of Dick’s gambeson and yanking him forward. Dick’s breath exits his chest in a rush, even as he wraps one hand around Slade’s wrist and reaches for his knife with the other. Too slow, though, as the large fingers of Slade’s free hand close around his own, stopping him.

“You are way off base, Your _Highness_.” he rumbles darkly, yet in a way that feels more like a chastisement than a threat. “And tempting as it is to bend you over my knee, I’m going to forgive you on this occasion for the insult. If only because I know you’re confused and afraid for your brother, as well as lacking some very crucial information about the situation.”

“What information?” Dick chokes, straining against the hold Slade has on him, while also trying to keep quiet his memories of being bent over Slade’s knee in the past. Albeit in a very different context. “What possible justification could you have for this?”

Slade’s nostrils flare, and his scent around Dick is as thick and suffocating as fog. He wants to scream at it. Wants to kiss and kill him. Wants to beg for the explanation Slade is so clearly taunting him with, and can only hope Roy isn’t watching them from afar with an arrow knocked to his bowstring right now. Things could go south very quickly if he is.

A tense moment passes, then another, before Slade finally lets him go. Dick’s gambeson and wrist are released, only for Slade to then run a hand up over his shoulder, briefly brushing the base of his throat.

“Come with me,” he says, voice once again level, “I’ll show you to your brother.”

Dick swallows thickly, still bleeding anger from every orifice, but in the end does just that, following close at Slade’s heels. He could still be walking into a trap, especially as entering Slade’s home takes him out of his guard’s line of sight. The lure of an answer to his question is one far too strong to ignore, though, especially considering Slade’s unexpectedly volatile reaction to the implication that he might have taken… _advantage,_ of Jason.

The interior of the house is cool compared to the summer heat outside. The decoration spartan but rich. Weapons hang on the walls in equal measure to works of art and tapestries. It speaks strongly to the identity of a man whose entire life has been spent fighting, and one who has profited immensely from doing so.

Which just makes it more confusing to Dick that he would steal Jason. Slade never seemed like someone who was interested in politics or the throne. And what other possible gain could he have for stealing a royal omega?

“Slade—” he starts to say.

“Wait,” the reply comes back, “We’re almost there.”

They must have traversed the entire length of the house from front to back, because the next door Slade approaches is almost a mirror to the one they entered by. He pushes it open, sunlight and the sound of birdsong follow, as well as a vision of green. The back gardens may easily be the most flamboyant part of Slade’s estate as he leads Dick across an open terrace and then down onto a path that heads into a cluster of flowering hedges. And as they make their way through it, the sound of voices carry through the air to Dick’s ears, male and female. The former of which is painfully familiar.

Suddenly losing all wariness, Dick’s pace picks up, until he’s actually passing Slade in a bid to reach his brother first.

“Jason!” he shouts, as he bursts into what is clearly meant to be a quiet outdoor sitting area, replete with benches. Two heads look round at him from one of them, one achingly familiar with hair dark and curling, while the other’s is long and white.

“Dick?” Jason startles, his eyes going wide at the sight of him. “You…” He swallows hard. “You got here fast.”

It’s not the response Dick expects to hear from him. “Of course I did,” he crosses the remaining distance between them, reaching out a hand to his brother, and is surprised when instead of taking it, Jason instead leans back into the woman beside him. A woman Dick now too recognises.

Rose Wilson, Slade’s youngest child. And an alpha.

“Prince Richard,” she says, almost warily. Her head dips, just a little, but Dick pays far less attention to that than the arm she has looped around Jason’s waist. “Slade, you said you’d tell us when someone came for him.”

“I’m telling you now, aren’t I?” Slade says from behind him, the lilt of amusement back in his voice.

“After he’s already here!” Rose glares back at her father, over Dick’s shoulder. “I swear to God, sometimes it’s like you want me to mad at you.”

“What’s going on here?” Dick’s eyes dart between them. “I don’t understand. Jason, what…” His brother, dressed in familiar red velvets and modest jewellery, doesn’t look like a prisoner. Doesn’t look unhappy or hurt, except for the way he’s watching Dick now. He doesn’t smell it, either. In fact, he…

His gaze lifts and focuses on Jason’s neck, covered by a high collar as is proper for an omega, particularly one of his noble standing, and as if on cue Jason’s hand lifts up, self-consciously pressing against the dark fabric there. “Jason…”

“You may want to sit down, Dick.” his brother says, nodding at another one of the benches. “Whatever you’ve been thinking up till now, I promise you you’re wrong.”

Dick stays standing, stiff as a statue at those words, until Slade’s hand finds his elbow and pulls him back. “Come on, kid, does as he says. You wanted an explanation for what I did. Best one you’re going to get is right from the horse’s mouth.”

Dick almost refuses on principle, but then Jason gives him an uncharacteristically pleading look and he relents. “Fine. Fine. Just please, all of you, tell me what’s going on here.”

He keeps his eyes fixed on his brother as he says it.

Jason breathes in deep, exchanging a quick glance with Rose before looking back at Dick. “Slade didn’t kidnap me. Well, he did. But only because I asked him to.”

Dick blinks. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Actually, it makes perfect sense, if Bruce or any of you had ever been paying attention.” Jason says, not without a note of bitterness in his voice. “You remember when the al Ghul army was attacking Gotham?”

Dick nods, because of course he does. It’s hard to forget a war happening, especially when you were fighting in the middle of it.

“Well, you and Bruce were busy off on the battlefield. But he made me stay behind with the rearguard to ‘hold the defensive line’ near the city, which of course was his fancy way of pacifying his delicate omega son from wanting to fight alongside him.”

Here Jason’s lip curls, and Dick winces with the memory of the arguments he and Bruce had back then. Jason’s insistence that he was a warrior as much as any of them, combined with Bruce’s protective desire to hold him back. Allowing him to be with the rearguard was much more than most other alphas would have allowed an omega to do, but it still wasn’t enough for Jason, and even by the time of his kidnapping their relationship still hadn’t recovered.

It had hurt Bruce, deeply. And it was only the fact that the court needed their King to keep things calm that had stopped him from marching here with their entire army at his heels himself.

“Bruce hired Deathstroke to help fight at your side. But Ravager… Rose,” Jason looks at her, and Dick can see where Rose is now soothingly running her hand up and down his waist. “She stayed with me, as a bodyguard. You were gone at the front for weeks, and we got—well, we got close.”

“Close.” Dick repeats, his eyes narrowing.

“Yeah.” Jason turns his face back to him, his expression mirroring Dick’s. “The same way and Deathstroke got _close_.”

He winces. It was impossible to miss what Jason’s implying with the way he and Rose are hanging over each other right now, but to have that brought up in response…

Did Slade tell him? Or was Dick sloppier than he thought in hiding it? Or maybe his little brother has always been more observant than Dick’s credited him for. Either way, his cheeks flush.

“So this… you asked Slade to steal—to kidnap you, so you could be together?”

It makes sense in more ways than one, now he’s had a little time to absorb it. The lack of evident struggle on Jason’s part at the site of the kidnap, as well as the fact that the men guarding him had been left alive. Bruce may have held him back from the front of the war, but there’s no doubting Dick’s little brother is still a warrior. If he hadn’t wanted to go with Slade he would have fought against him, _violently_.

Dick shakes his head, rubbing at his face with the heel of his palm. “Why didn’t you just tell us, Jason? We would have understood. Bruce—”

“Bruce would have reminded me of my duty.” Jason snaps. “Of a royal omega’s role in building alliances between other countries and houses with ours. Mating with a mercenary's bastard daughter wouldn’t exactly fit in line with that.”

Dick winces, but both Slade and Rose simply snort in amusement. Rose even goes so far as to grin and nip at Jason’s ear, more playful than chastising. “I did offer to plead my case, but Jay was pretty adamant it wouldn’t be worth it. So instead we talked to my dad and came up with a plan to get round the whole bullshit alpha permission thing another way.”

“Bruce can’t say no now that it’s already happened.” Jason says flatly. “We spent my heat together; I have Rose’s mark on my neck. That bond can’t just be undone, even if there is some alpha prince or highborn lordling who’d still want me after this.”

Dick bites his lip. “But why not just steal him yourself, Rose? Why send Slade to do it?”

“Because in the event something went wrong, I’d be the one blamed.” Slade rumbles from behind him. “I still might be, depending on how things go now.”

“You’re protecting her.” Dick says, in soft realisation.

“She’s my pup.” Slade says, shrugging his shoulders. “And she was determined to do it either way. Figured I might as well make sure it went down successfully.”

“Wow, thanks for the vote of confidence in my abilities, Dad.”

Slade ignores her, remaining focused on Dick. “So now the only question is, what are you going to do about it, kid?”

He’s not the only one looking at him. Jason and Rose are too, and the intensity of their combined attention has Dick faltering.

“I don’t know.” he answers truthfully. During the time it had taken to get here, he’d had a lot of time to theorise and obsess over what he thought had happened, as well as make a lot of very painful assumptions. Assumptions that he now feels a rush of shame over, thinking how he had accused Slade earlier. “I don’t know. This is all so… This is really what you want?” He looks at his brother. “You’re happy here?”

Jason meets his gaze evenly. “Yes, Dick. This is what I want.”

As he says it, he leans further into Rose, joining one hand to hers and gripping it tight.

Dick swallows thickly. It hits him with a pang that he missed this about Jason. They had their issues when he was younger, but that was a long time ago, and he’s always prided himself on caring for his family. He wants to ask Jason why he didn’t think he could trust Dick with this. Why he had to hide the fact he’s in love. Though Dick suspects that if he did, he wouldn’t much like the answer.

Not to mention, it’s also a conversation he’d rather have alone with Jason than in front of Rose and Slade.

He presses his hand against his face again. “I need to think about this.”

“Come on, kid,” Slade puts a hand on his elbow, “Let’s go back inside.”

* * *

They end up in Slade's study. Dick sitting in a chair with a cup of wine clenched in his hand. Jason and Rose remained outside, to continue doing whatever they were doing before he got here, so it’s just him and Slade together now. Which feels awkward in more ways than one.

Dick’s head is still spinning with everything he’s learned in the past half hour, while his instinct to drag his wayward pack member home battles against his need not to make an enemy of his little brother by forcibly removing him from the woman he so clearly loves. It’s a mess, all of it, and Dick can’t even begin to imagine what Bruce will say when he hears the news.

“I wish you’d talked to me about this,” he says, staring down at his cup, “If you’d just told me what you were planning from the start…”

Slade inclines his head, “So you could go and try to talk Jason out of it? No, I don’t think so. He didn’t want to put you in the position of being torn between him or doing your duty by telling your father, either.”

“He didn’t or you didn’t?”

Slade shrugs, which is as much an answer as it isn’t.

Dick slumps back in his chair. He’s never been much of a wine drinker, and the way his stomach is churning now makes it even more unappealing. Carefully, he sets the cup aside. “Slade, I… I’m sorry for what I said to you earlier. What I accused you of. I shouldn’t have—”

“You had your reasons to think it.” Slade cuts him off, shifting his weight where he’s standing next to the currently cold and empty fireplace. He, on the other hand, has no problems whatsoever sipping on his drink.

“I should have known better. Should have trusted my gut when I first heard the news that Jason was taken.” Dick shakes his head. “I knew it didn’t make sense that you would do that. But then listening to the suppositions of the court and the time it took to ride over here… I couldn’t stop the doubts creeping in. I was so afraid that I’d…”

“That you’d what, kid?”

Dick closes his eyes. “Misjudged you. That I’d misjudged our… relationship. That—” his throat and belly tighten in conjunction with one another, “—I wasn’t good enough for you, after everything we survived together. After—”

“You and Jason are exactly the same.”

“What?” His eyes fly back open, staring at Slade.

Slade swirls his own cup of wine. “Oh not like that. Not like what you’re so obsessively worrying your pretty little head about. But in how you’re both constantly weighing and measuring yourselves against others’ expectations of you. How you’re both constantly afraid you’re not good enough, no matter how much evidence there is to the contrary.” He takes a sip. “I have to hand it to Wayne, the man’s inability to express affection normally really does make for terrible inferiority complexes in his children.”

Dick’s mouth falls open, before his jaw clenches. “You’re one to talk.” he says, drawn instinctively to defend his adoptive father.

“And yet somehow he also manages to inspire such tremendous loyalty.” Slade responds, lips curving in a half-smile. He drains the rest of his cup in a way that’s hardly befitting the quality of its vintage, then places it down above the mantle. “If I were a worse kind of man, I could really take advantage of that fact.”

He walks across the room towards Dick, effectively closing the space between them in only a couple of paces, before reaching down with one hand to cup his cheek. The motion, combined with the warm, dry, calloused feeling of his palm against his skin, is enough to make Dick’s breath catch. Enough to remind him that it has been a good few months since he was last this close to Slade, especially without anyone else around to watch them.

“I knew exactly what was going to happen when I did this, kid.” Slade’s thumb presses against the space below Dick’s left eye, rubbing small circles into his flesh. “I knew the kind of thoughts that would end up running through your head. It was a risk I took, a calculated one, that despite that you’d understand once you knew the truth.”

Dick lips his lips. “So you’re not angry with me?”

“Not really. Are you still with me?”

“A little.” Dick admits, because he is. Part of him still feels betrayed. Wishes Slade would have trusted him to do the right thing, even though Dick isn’t sure he really wouldn’t have told Bruce if he had.

“Hmph.” Slade looks amused. “But not enough that you want me to stop doing this, right?”

His thumb pushes harder against Dick’s skin, while his other hand moves to grip Dick’s waist as Slade leans in closer to him. The scent of another alpha, woodsmoke and metal, fills his lungs inescapably, sending hot bolts of lust straight to Dick’s groin. “Slade… My brother...”

“I’ve hurt my children enough in the past.” Slade says, his gaze for a moment distant. “For once, I wanted to do something right by my daughter. Even if I know she’ll still never forgive me for those other mistakes. Whatever the fallout from this is for me, I’ll weather it. The only question is if I can trust you to have their side as well.”

To have their side. Rose and Jason’s. But also to have Slade’s as well. To stand up to Bruce’s judgement, and say that Jason’s happiness is more important than duty. To say that Slade’s actions in helping them achieve it were just, rather than treacherous.

“You know, I never took you for a romantic.” he says instead, forcing a smile onto his lips.

Slade snorts. “I’m not. Romance is for idiots and poets.”

“I suppose you best call me an idiot, then.” Dick replies, and this time his smile is more genuine.

“Well, you certainly aren’t a poet.” Slade rolls his eye. Then in a single, powerful motion, he’s pulling Dick up out of his seat to stand leaning against his chest. Dick looks up into his face, at the strong line of his jaw, handsome features and aquiline nose—the surprisingly soft white hair framing all of it. “You stink too much that stallion of yours right now, not enough like me.”

Dick swallows. He still has so much to process. So much to think about. He still has to make a decision, openly, even if in his heart he knows he’s already made it. He made it the moment he saw Jason look at him in the garden, wrapped up in Rose’s arms.

“My men are waiting outside. I told them if I didn’t return in three hours—”

“Which, by my count, still leaves you with at least two hours to spare.” Slade’s thumb finds his lip, tugging at it even as he leans in to first scent Dick’s neck, then nip at it. “Plenty of time to remind you who you belong to. Unless, of course, you like smelling like horse.”

“You’re a bastard,” Dick says, but there’s no venom in the words. No, he wants to give in. Wants to wash away the whole past week of fear and doubt with the realness of his lover around him.

And so, reaching back for Slade in turn, he does.

**Author's Note:**

> [My tumblr](https://firefrightfic.tumblr.com/)


End file.
